A specification for a software module is a statement of the requirements that the final programs must meet. In this paper we concentrate on that portion of the specification that describes the interface between the module being specified and other programs (or persons) that will interact with that module. Because of the complexity of software products, it is advantageous to be able to evaluate the design of this interface without reference to any possible implementations. The first sections of this paper present an approach to the writing of black box specifications, that takes advantage of Guttag's work on abstract specification [91.Then we illustrate it on a number of small examples, and discuss checking the completeness of a specification. Finally we describe a case history of a module design. Although the module is a simple one, the early specifications (written using an earlier notation) contained design flaws that were not detected in spite of the involvement of several persons in a series of discussions about the module. These errors are easily recognized using the method introduced in this paper.
Background
The vigilant observation of medical devices during post-market surveillance (PMS) for identifying safety-relevant incidents is a non-trivial task. A wide range of sources has to be monitored in order to integrate all accessible data about the safety and performance of a medical device. PMS needs to be supported by an efficient search strategy and the possibility to create complex search queries by domain experts.
Results
We use ontologies to support the specification of search queries and the preparation of the document corpus, which contains all relevant documents. In this paper, we present (1) the Search Ontology (SON) v2.0, (2) an Excel template for specifying search queries, and (3) the Search Ontology Generator (SONG), which generates complex queries out of the Excel template. Based on our approach, a service-oriented architecture was designed, which supports and assists domain experts during PMS. Comprehensive testing confirmed the correct execution of all SONG functions. The applicability of our method and of the developed tools was evaluated by domain experts. The test persons concordantly rated our solution after a short period of training as highly user-friendly, intuitive and well applicable for supporting PMS.
Conclusions
The Search Ontology is a promising domain-independent approach to specify complex search queries. Our solution allows advanced searches for relevant documents in different domains using suitable domain ontologies.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.